The Radio Boys on the Mexican Border eBook

It had been a long discussion, and Bob and Frank were
content to do as Mr. Temple proposed. Jack, perforce,
agreed, although the strain of the last few days,
which he had carried alone, was beginning to tell
on him and he yearned for instant action. He showed
the others to their rooms, Bob and Mr. Temple sharing
Mr. Hampton’s room, and Frank bunking in with
Jack himself.

After Frank had undressed and tumbled into bed, so
dog-tired, as he said, that he could barely keep his
eyes open to see the way to his pillow, Jack went
out to stand in the starlight on the porch. After
leaning against a pillar some minutes, during which
his active brain kept milling endlessly over the details
of the past few days, he had an impulse to go over
to the radiophone station and talk to the guard, an
ex-cowboy, on duty there since the attack by three
Mexicans at the time this story opened.

Hands in his pockets, head bowed in thought, he moved
across the hard packed sand, his feet making practically
no sound.

CHAPTER XII

JACK DISCOVERS A TRAITOR

Two figures stood at the door of the radio station
power house. The station was a duplicate of Mr.
Hampton’s other station on his Long Island estate,
earlier described. So engrossed were the two men
in whispered conversation that they were unaware of
Jack’s noiseless approach.

The soft sibilant sound of whispering which came to
his ears just as he was about to approach the door
roused Jack from his reflections. His suspicions
were on the alert because of the happenings of recent
days, and he halted. Certain, after standing a
moment with every nerve tensed, that he had not been
seen, Jack backed cautiously until again around the
corner of the building.

Who were the two men? What were they whispering
about? Pressing against the side of the building,
Jack thought quickly. One of the two must be
the night watchman. Perhaps the other was the
man who kept guard at the station by day. If
he were, thought Jack, then, perhaps, some new danger
menaced and the night man had called the day man to
help him. This theory also would account for the
fact that they were whispering, instead of conversing
in normal tones.

So probable did this supposition seem to Jack that
he decided to join the men and ask what the danger
was. Caution, however, prompted him to reconnoitre
by peeping around the corner before stepping into the
open. The next moment he was thankful he had done
so. For, as he looked, one of the two struck
a match and held it in cupped hands to a cigarette,
and Jack saw the man was Remedios.

Drawing his head back quickly, Jack leaned against
the building, trying to compose his thoughts.
What was Remedios doing here? Not many hours
before he had foiled the plan of the traitorous Mexican
chauffeur to deliver him and his friends to the enemy.
Was Tom, the ex-cowboy, on guard at the radio plant,
a traitor? Jack could not believe it.